


To Break Other Things

by betweenheroesandvillains



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Mind Games, Torture, alternative title: Marcus Cutter is a sadistic bastard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:08:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23099086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betweenheroesandvillains/pseuds/betweenheroesandvillains
Summary: It’s 2009, and Cutter recruits Warren Kepler because Kepler is interesting. Cutter likes the idea of ripping him open, and spends the next six years trying to do exactly that.
Relationships: (if you squint) - Relationship, Daniel Jacobi & Warren Kepler & Alana Maxwell, Daniel Jacobi/Warren Kepler, Marcus Cutter & Warren Kepler
Comments: 2
Kudos: 37





	To Break Other Things

**Author's Note:**

> Please be mindful of the violence tags.

His name is Marcus Cutter, not because it goes well with Pryce (as he told Miranda) or because he’d once met a Marcus Cutter, way back, who’d left a lasting impression (although that would not entirely be a lie). His name is Marcus Cutter because he has a penchant for peeling back peoples’ personalities and layers and masks to find their core – to find, he thinks, what they truly want. And through that to arrive at what they truly fear. And sometimes to get the one he has to indulge the other, and to indulge the other he has to engineer very specific situations. It’s one of his favourite pastimes, whenever PR is too boring and there is no major catastrophe to cover up. There is nothing on Earth that feels as good as twisting the knife stuck inside someone’s biggest fears.

It’s 2009, and Cutter recruits Warren Kepler because Kepler is _interesting_. Kepler is intelligent, vicious, resourceful, flexible, obedient but not to a suicidal degree, and most importantly he is ambitious. Cutter likes the idea of ripping him open, and accepts the challenge with glee. Kepler’s masks are better than most, his layers thicker. Sometimes his reactions are a red herring, a strawman on a stage while the real Warren Kepler exits left, taking all his intents with him. They have long-winded conversations that lead nowhere, one attempt after the other by Cutter to crack Kepler. Sometimes he loses a mask by accident. Cutter finds out about his latent alcoholism because he overdoes it once and Cutter, through decades of experience, knows what to look for. They meet in the middle and Cutter carefully peels that mask off, almost giddily hoping for raw flesh underneath. But all he gets is another mask. He is frustrated enough to snap open a butterfly knife so close to Kepler’s throat that it nicks his skin. He is, however, _not_ frustrated enough to actually go through with slitting Kepler’s throat. He says, “Take this as a warning, Kepler. No more secrets. No more transgressions.” And Kepler, a thin stream of blood running down the side of his neck, answers, “Yes, sir.” Cutter thinks that this game may be one of the best ones he has played in a while.

2011\. Daniel Jacobi is more than his name, and more than his face. Warren Kepler sends a list of Jacobi’s assumed skills as an attachment to a formal E-mail asking for “permission to personally test the subject,” which is the corporate version of “throw him into a minefield and see if he makes it out alive.” Cutter sends a perfunctory affirmation and goes back to all the other things he has to keep an eye on, mostly the next Hephaestus mission. He has hand-picked the crew, but some of them still need convincing. It’s time to raise the stakes for them.

The year continues uneventfully aside from the fact that Kepler does hire Jacobi, and that, against all odds, Jacobi survives his first three months. There is an incident about five weeks in that Cutter didn’t even engineer but that he analyses, later on, where Jacobi is too close to an explosion and gets his eardrums ripped to shreds. Goddard Futuristics, being a good employer, takes over the medical bills of repairing him. He racks up a good hundred grand, meaning that he’ll be indebted to them forever. It’s good enough for Cutter because it means he can’t just leave. Bought loyalty is a reliable, non-volatile version of loyalty.

“Mister Jacobi,” Cutter says smoothly. “Please, have a seat. Can I offer you something to drink?” Jacobi still has half his face covered in bandages (the left half, to be precise), so his expression is hard to read. But he sits straight, not touching the backrest, hands resting loosely on his thighs. Military family, but rebelling against it. No. Not rebelling. Cutter suppresses a shark smile. “No, sir. Thank you.” Little Daniel Jacobi wants to please. He wants to please and he has never been good enough. Cutter laces his fingers together. _Oh this is going to be so much fun._ “It is good to see you are doing better, Mr. Jacobi. We were all worried. Goddard Futuristics values all its employees, and every loss is one too many.” Jacobi keeps his hands calm, but his fingers shake slightly as he keeps them from touching his bandages. “How is your recovery coming along?” It’s not like he doesn’t know the answer to that. He went through the files last night, giddy with anticipation. “It’s coming along well, sir, thank you. The hospital staff is very forthcoming, and I should be discharged within the week.” Cutter approximates a kind smile. “I am very glad to hear that, Daniel. May I call you Daniel?” He says it quick, kind, and it confuses the hell out of Daniel Kenneth Jacobi so all he can say is, “Uh, of course, sir.” A little win in a long game. “We are looking forward to having you back,” Cutter says. “But,” he adds, almost as an afterthought, “of course, there will have to be some psychological evaluation.” Jacobi opens his mouth, so Cutter raises a hand. “Now, nothing to worry about I am sure. Still, I would like some questions answered before I send you to the psychologists.” He pulls a few sheets of paper from a drawer, then reaches for the fountain pen. Call him old-fashioned but there is nothing like the feeling of an expensive, heavy pen.

“Now, Daniel, if you will, please summarise again what happened at…” he pretends to check his notes, “Malstrom Air Force Base? Just two or three sentences should suffice.” Jacobi thinks before he answers. “Lieutenant Colonel Kepler and I triggered an alarm we did not mean to trigger and were caught in the building. To get out, I had to improvise a bomb. I underestimated the force of the explosive and sustained expectable injuries.” He is leaving out the bit where he made sure his body was between the impromptu bomb and Kepler before detonating it, but Cutter finds it a permissible omission. “And you got out…?” It’s a leading question, communications 101. Jacobi takes the bait but is mindful of his wording. “I can’t remember much, sir, but I have been told that Lieutenant Colonel Kepler made sure I made it to safety.” Cutter raises an eyebrow. He has seen the footage. And he knows how Kepler gets when he is under immense stress. It would have been so easy to dismiss his actions. And yet… “I have been told he was the one to get you to hospital.” Jacobi shrugs. “I have been told the same but I frankly do not remember that at all. Sir.” Jacobi has shaken himself off the hook. Clever man. “Thank you very much, Daniel.” Jacobi nods. “Of course, sir.”

After Jacobi has left his office, Cutter pulls out a tablet and spends the next hour re-watching the security camera footage from Jacobi’s hospital room. Warren Kepler sits in the only chair and watches an unconscious Jacobi. The time stamp says it’s three-thirty in the morning. 

April 2012 finds Marcus Cutter, Goddard Futuristics Director of Communications, bashing Warren Kepler’s head against the corner of an expensive ebony desk.  
The wood is sturdy yet chips under the weight of Kepler and Cutter’s sheer force. Despite the display, Cutter is careful about it. Kepler is useful and he doesn’t want to damage him beyond repair. He just needs to make a point. “Now, Warren,” he says and picks a hair from his fingernails while Kepler bleeds across his expensive Isfahan. Kepler moans, probably in pain. Cutter decides to take it as an answer. “Can you guess why you are here today?” Kepler tries to hoist himself up but a kick to his ribs puts an immediate stop to that. “No need to get up yet, Warren. Just tell my why you think you are here, in my office, in this very moment.” A pause, a break in the conversation. The light in the office is slightly yellow, a warm colour. Cutter finds that blue light gives him headaches.  
“In… insubordination, sir.” The right corner of Marcus Cutter’s mouth ticks up. “Well done, Warren. And what kind of insubordination?” Kepler’s breathing is short and comes in bursts, a broken rib or two. “In… direct insubordination, sir.” A small touch of Cutter’s black leather shoe to Kepler’s side, a suppressed curling motion of his whole body – two broken ribs it is. “Good. You can get up now. Let’s resume the conversation in a more civilised manner.” He steps over Kepler and takes a seat behind the beautiful, though now defiled, desk. Kepler scrambles to get into the chair, as far as Kepler can even scramble. Blood is still pouring from the headwound and his eyes are unfocussed. “Now, Warren, the details please. And keep it to the absolute necessary.” Kepler swallows.

“During the mission, Mister Jacobi was a helpful asset due to his chemical knowledge. The destruction of Fahrenheit’s latest developments went faster due t-” Cutter taps the tip of his foot against Kepler’s shin. “Necessary and relevant,” he reminds gently.  
“Jacobi tried to take one of the developed explosives for his own research. It was found out during the debriefing. Corporate policies on theft are clear.”  
“Mhm. Remind me of them, Warren.” Kepler is holding on to clarity with every last inch of his being and Cutter enjoys seeing him struggle. “Termination, sir.” The term was chosen by Cutter because it leaves some delicious leeway. Members of the SI-5 are officially missing, assumed dead, anyway, and crafting a new identity after something as serious as theft or corporate espionage is simply not profitable. “So, Warren, if the policies are clear, then tell me why we should keep Mister Jacobi as an employee of Goddard Futuristics?”   
“Because, sir,” Warren says, slightly slurred, “he is one of the best at what he does. Maybe even _the_ best.” Cutter signs for him to keep going. “He is practical, creative, flexible. I genuinely do not think we will ever find anyone as capable as him again, and in his unique situation.” It had indeed been easy to make Daniel Jacobi disappear, almost disconcertingly so. And he had not minded at all.

Cutter interlaces his fingers, eyes trained on Warren Kepler’s face. The Lieutenant Colonel is right about Jacobi, but he has also missed the most important characteristics: ruthless, and intelligent. More than anything, those are the reasons to keep Jacobi – he doubts there is anyone out there quite like him. An explosion, yes, but controlled, precise, within boundaries. Sharp as a knife. (Not as sharp as Cutter or Pryce. In his own way as sharp as whatever name Volodin is going by these days.) Jacobi can read between the lines, which is why Cutter is sure the message he is sending will be understood. He pulls on a smile, all teeth, no softness. “Sound reasoning, Warren. He can stay. For now.” Cutter exhales, gets up and walks around his desk to stand before Kepler. “You are demoted back to Major for the time being.” He wrings a wince from Kepler by putting a finger under his chin to make them meet eye to eye.

“I need you to understand one thing, Kepler. I’m reprimanding _you_ because Jacobi is part of _your_ team, and _you_ lost control over him. His insubordination may be his mistake, and it _will_ have consequences, but more than anything it reflects poorly on your abilities as head of the team, and head of the department.” Cutter leans forwards. The blood has soaked through Warren’s collar. “Next time I will not be so kind, so take this for the warning it is, Warren. Dismissed.” Kepler gets up, walks out with slow, measured, unsure steps. He starts retching before the door is fully shut.

Hephaestus III fails in August. Volodin, now Selberg, future Hilbert, is officially made Kepler’s problem. Cutter has plans, and his eye on a young communications expert who is in some serious trouble. This means that for some time he loses sight of his employees. Next time he looks, Kepler and Jacobi seems to have become KeplerandJacobi, as in, some kind of item. Cutter wishes he could have seen that mask slip. Maybe get his fingers underneath it and rip it off. Then he realizes that he still can.

The fact that he is clearly reluctant about following this order speaks for Jacobi’s intelligence. The fact that he still comes speaks for his obedience. Cutter notes both as he says, “Ah, Daniel. Come in, come in!” He doesn’t move from where he is standing in front of a one-way mirror. They are on the side that allows looking through. The room on the other side is blood-splattered. “Mister Cutter.” Jacobi keeps his distance and has not looked yet. “You wanted to see me?” Cutter laughs lightly, nodding. “Yes, yes. Please, come here.” He points to a spot right beside himself. Jacobi obeys. Now there is no way he can’t look through the mirror, and Cutter watches him go pale. He has to concede, it is quite a view. Kepler is good at many things, and enhanced interrogation is one of them. He has taken off his jacket and shirt, both folded up on a chair in the far corner of the room, right next to the door. His undershirt really shows off his broad shoulders and biceps, and the Goddard trousers do wonders for his legs. Far better than any standard military uniform. The way he is twisting a sharp tool into the detainee’s thigh can almost be called delicate. “I wanted to ask how your work is coming along.” Jacobi swallows audibly and can’t tear his eyes off the picture.

On the other side of the wall, Warren is pulling out the tool and with it a chunk of flesh. Blood wells over the man’s leg and he opens his mouth, probably screaming. The room is soundproof. Not even Cutter can hear a thing.

“It’s… We are doing quite well, sir.” Swallowing again. Warren speaks for a bit before drawing the tool over the man’s chest in a mock version of a lover’s caress. Then he stabs it into the shoulder, right where the joint is. Jacobi starts sweating. “The new explosive is quite… potent, but we have finally found the right amount to just blow up a flat and not have the whole house crumble around us. Another week and we should have it down to a room.” Cutter still stares at the spectacle, at more blood covering the floor. So does Jacobi. “Well done. And the… other thing?” Warren is now busy trailing his hand along the man’s throat. Clamping down. The man gasps for air, attempts to pull back, can’t move. “The… the radioac… I’m sorry sir,” Jacobi tears his gaze from the picture in the other room. “Can we have this conversation somewhere else?” Cutter smiles thin-lipped. So Jacobi has seen what he was supposed to see.

“Why, Daniel? Does the display of violence bother you?” Jacobi’s eyes are on the bleeding, crying, choking man. The man with dark, half-long hair, the man with dark eyes, the man who, for all intents and purposes, could be Jacobi’s brother, maybe even his twin. The man that is being taken apart by Warren Kepler. Kepler lets go of the man’s throat and Jacobi says, “No, sir. Of course not, sir, I…” Cutter interjects smoothly. “Of course not.” The words, _So quit arguing_ , are heavily implied. Jacobi hears them nonetheless. He clears his throat, blinks twice and says, “The radioactive material is still proving a problem. Very volatile. We can control the explosion but not the dispersion of the radiation. We are working on it, but it will almost certainly take more than three months and a patent on a new explosive.”

While he’s talking Warren makes a show of picking up a sharp knife, saying something. The other man can’t speak, not with how he is crying, not with the tool still stuck in his shoulder. Warren’s cuts on the man’s face are viciously precise and quickly lay bare the muscle under his left eye. Jacobi physically forces his hand down when it is about to touch the same spot on his own face. “Thank you, Daniel,” Cutter drawly lazily. “You are dismissed.” Daniel almost flees the scene.

Twenty minutes later the man is but a corpse and Warren is shaking all over. Cutter’s eyes trace his every movement as he gently pushes the dead man’s head back and closes his eyes. Then Kepler stiffens, turns, stares at the one-way mirror. Cutter tilts his head, fingers flexing. The mask is slipping, and slipping, and underneath is Warren Kepler, raw and in pain. Cutter sees the fear. But he doesn’t quite have his hooks in it. That is his next step. His tongue runs over the sharp edge of his teeth, and Cutter tastes blood.

2013 brings the beginning of the new Hephaestus mission (good) and Alana Maxwell (very good). Kepler finishes cleaning up behind Hephaestus III and keeps his distance to Jacobi professional. Not too far, not far enough to be obvious. Cutter keeps a tab on them, just a peek when he doesn’t have anything else to do. Maxwell and Jacobi bought flats on opposite ends of town from their first paycheques but spend more time together than apart, usually at Maxwell’s place. It’s another thing Cutter only knows because he keeps a tab on it. Warren may have brought Alana Maxwell in but Cutter’s had an eye on her ever since she demolished the MIT’s curriculum and got her B.A. within a bit over a year. If Pryce still had some interest in humanity she’d have asked him to recruit Maxwell. That woman has infinite potential and the horrible disadvantage of not working for Goddard. And then Warren sends an E-mail, subject line ‘New Recruit’, attachment personnel file “Alana S. Maxwell, PhD”. The mail says she comes recommended, Cutter wonders by whom. Not Jacobi, that much is clear. He is forced to consider that Warren Kepler has friends in adjacent departments. At least trusted colleagues. That’s not a comforting thought, somehow. In his personal interest he still sends Warren out for Doctor Maxwell. Her doctoral work is permanently saved on Cutter’s personal computer, a rare occurrence.

It takes Warren a whopping six months to succeed. Goddard Futuristics sends Jacobi out on several small assignments with other groups and allows him to take his time to develop a new kind of explosive that Cutter genuinely does not understand but that appears to be based on silver. Should he ever start caring he may need to dig out his chemistry knowledge again. Then Alana Maxwell comes in, and it takes another two days and the silver explosives are done and Goddard Futuristics has a whole new department working on A.I. linguistics set up. Cutter sees why Warren took an interest in her. Even in this place, with every opportunity, every advancement at her fingertips, Alana Maxwell still pushes. Pushes the way Kepler pushes, striving towards better, ever better. And she has a way of pulling all the relevant people with her. Namely, Daniel Jacobi. So, no, Cutter does not particularly mind that they practically abandon their respective laboratories and half move in together because for Goddard, the results are amazing. He only cares because suddenly, Kepler is not just his plaything anymore. 

He promotes Kepler to Colonel in 2014, because Kepler’s team gets things done and because he needs him to be as high in rank as possible, just in case things go sideways with Hephaestus IV. It would be wrong to say Cutter has not been in for this version of the long game, too, has not planned for Kepler to go into space, hasn’t sent him and his team up on missions in preparation for exactly this.

One uneventful day in early 2015 shifts the puzzle pieces together. Finally. It’s a mission going sideways, which was to be expected. They would not have sent SI-5 otherwise. Kepler is busy because Cutter made sure he would be. This mission does not require him – it requires someone with a viciously precise understanding of electronics, and someone who can make big things turn to dust, so that is who Goddard sends.

For some reason, the company whose labs they are supposed to break into know that they are coming. For another and totally unrelated reason, Marcus Cutter is hacked into every camera he could get his hands on to watch the ensuing fight. It’s an experiment. He watches Maxwell type frantically while Jacobi’s expert hands connect small bombs to different computers in the room. He puts the finishing touches to a set of miniature bombs when thirty guards break through the door and point their guns at the first person they spot, which happens to be Doctor Maxwell. That is, in hindsight, what causes the chain of events. Alana Maxwell is in the line of fire and Jacobi goes haywire.

He goes haywire in the cleanest, most orderly fashion Cutter has ever seen anyone go haywire. Every action is thought through and calculated. The bullet tears through her and Daniel Jacobi’s hand is on a detonator, immediately followed by a row of micro-explosions. Cutter finds himself thinking that he has not been following Jacobi’s development as intently as he should have. While the guards are still confused by the first set of detonations Jacobi shoots three of them before pulling Maxwell out of her chair and triggering a second wave. Body parts and debris fly past them and the camera shakes precariously. After a breathless minute, Jacobi extracts himself from Maxwell who is tucked securely beneath him. He signs something, a private movement Cutter can’t decipher. Maxwell nods, both hands pressed to the wound in her side. Jacobi pulls her to her feet, rips some cloth off his singed shirt, makes her press that against the bloody spot. He gives her something else to hold in the now free right hand, gestures again. Alana takes a step back, apparently stubborn. They talk for longer than is safe. An argument maybe, or planning, or… Maxwell’s face softens and she nods. Jacobi turns, carefully bumping his shoulder into hers. They walk quickly to the next junction. Alana says something before turning left. Jacobi goes right, walking, as Cutter can see, straight towards a group of security personnel. He must have heard them. He must be _seeing_ them by now.  
Then it hits Cutter. The missing puzzle piece, the last step, the hook in the flesh of Kepler’s fears, the turn of the knife. It all unfolds before him the moment he realizes that Daniel Jacobi is doing something self-destructive in an attempt to buy Maxwell more time.  
Jacobi pulls a small silver disc from one pocket and a lighter from another. His smile is grim when he brings the two together, not walking any longer. The guards crowd in on him, he raises a hand ---  
The camera goes black when the blast wave hits it.

For two weeks nobody knows whether they are alive. Well. Nobody except for Cutter, who enjoys watching Warren Kepler go mad with worry because it feels like he is finally, finally prying that mask off. He is opening Warren Kepler like a particularly stubborn oyster. Then Cutter gets alerted to the fact that Maxwell, Dr. A. and Jacobi, D. have entered the building and makes his way to the lobby. On his way out he asks his secretary to notify Warren’s secretary that Colonel Kepler will be needed on level Zero, immediately. He takes the elevator down, mentally sharpening his knives.  
Alana and Daniel look… singed. Battered. Triumphant. She had to cut her hair and holds her left arm at a strange angle, her whole body the epitome of a relieving posture. His nose is taped into place and every visible inch of his skin is bruised. Both are smiling victoriously.  
Enter, stage right, Colonel Warren Kepler. For a moment, everything stills. The chatter in the lobby dies down. Kepler stares at Maxwell and Jacobi. The two stare back.   
They fall into each other like there is nothing but the others holding them upright. And Cutter thinks, _Jackpot_. Now he has them. Now he knows how it is. What it is. A simple chain. Kepler fears for Jacobi, and Jacobi fears for Maxwell.  
It doesn’t matter what Maxwell fears. Cutter has her, which means he has Jacobi, which means he has Kepler. The game is over. Cutter wins. Again. It was predictable, but Kepler put up a valiant fight and he can acknowledge that. There are many good teams working for Goddard Futuristics. If they weren’t good, they would not be there. But the Kepler-Trio has become the most ruthless, most monstrous, most effective. And fully under Cutter’s control. Which is why, in late winter 2015, he calls Kepler into his office and tells him to hand-pick whoever he wants to take to Wolf 359.

Kepler doesn’t surprise him. As they exchange a long look, Cutter thinks that Kepler doesn’t need to anymore. He dismisses Kepler with a nod but before he’s reached the door he calls after him, a little display of the vast power he wields. “Oh, and Warren?” Kepler turns around, his face carefully controlled but unable to hide the half-heartbeat of pain crossing it. “Yes, sir?” Cutter smiles as he crosses his ankles.

“Don’t make me come up there.”


End file.
